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Labour To Remove Free Speech Safeguard

The Labour Party has made a manifesto commitment to abolish a free speech safeguard introduced by Lord Waddington to a sexual orientation ‘hate’ crime law. The safeguard makes clear that criticising homosexual conduct, or encouraging someone to refrain from such conduct, is not in itself a crime.

But the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, says a new Labour Government would use the Parliament Acts to forcibly remove it, ignoring the House of Lords if need be.

The safeguard is known by some as the “Waddington amendment” because it was successfully introduced by Lord Waddington amid a backdrop of Christians being investigated by police for expressing their opinions on homosexual conduct. See the Christian Institute article for more info.

If this free speech safeguard is removed, England and Wales will come into line with Scotland where a man was put in a cell overnight before being fined £1000 for replying to a question about whether homosexual sex is sin.

Shawn Holes was in Scotland with a group of American colleagues preaching on a wide variety of topics.

“I was talking generally about Christianity and sin”, he said.

He continued: “I only talked about these other issues because I was specifically asked.

“There were homosexuals listening – around six or eight – who were kissing each other and cuddling, and asking ‘What do you think of this?’”

He responded to questions from the crowd about homosexuality. He affirmed that everyone, including homosexuals, needed to receive Christ as Saviour.

Mr Holes later commented: “It felt like a set-up by gay campaigners.”

The accusation was that he had used “homophobic remarks” that were “aggravated by religious prejudice”.

Labour is determined to remove the present free speech safeguard. It is they who want to decide what is sin and what is not sin.